[Team] Racing Point: What now for Force India

[E.B]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

will Stroll Sr become the new team principle?

i would think he would be be like VJ.... a sort of figurehead leader who looks after the VIPs and poseurs. I hope so anyway. Robert Fernley and Otmar Szafnauer seem to run a tight ship well, and if the word of all jobs intact is true....

[Peter Mallett]

Yes indeed. But it seems the business world likes it.

Edit: this was in response to bjs above.

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by P38 in workshop

So where will Perez find himself when the dust settles?

Haas.

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[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Haas.

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Replacing Grosjean or Magnussen?

[loon]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

Replacing Grosjean or Magnussen?

yes

[BSchneiderFan]

Tough choice. Magnussen has generally looked racier and is less accident-prone, but Grosjean has scored their best result.

[chunterer]

Grosjean is not going to get any better and will always be prone to random periods where form vanishes and he has a shunt.

He is probably the current equivalent oj Jumper Jarier!

Kmag appears to be improving every year and is both quick and consistent. That is good F1 anchorman material.

Perez would give them additional speed and consistency or they could take a punt on a rookie hotshoe.

[Skam85]

Originally Posted by chunterer

2001, had the BMW engines not blown up all the time, he would have been much closer to Ferrari. A BMW insider once reckoned that they really could have beaten Ferrari had they been upto scratch straight away as the engine was the most powerful by far.

2003 people keep saying it should have been Kimi but when I spoke to Jonny Williams at Thruxton recently, he agreed that title was Juan's but a couple of mechanical issues, a couple of his errors and the Monza Ferrari Michelin stitch up put paid to that!

The penalty he got in 2003 USA really took the wind out of his sails. That was the year for JPM to win it.

[S griffin]

I too hope Stroll, like VJ is a figurehead and let’s people like Fearnley run the team. The question is, will Checo or Ocon go?

[Moneyseeker]

Perez, they will need to keep Ocon for Mercedes.

Originally Posted by S griffin

I too hope Stroll, like VJ is a figurehead and let’s people like Fearnley run the team. The question is, will Checo or Ocon go?

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[BSchneiderFan]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Perez, they will need to keep Ocon for Mercedes.

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Unless Mercedes favour Williams.

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by BSchneiderFan

Unless Mercedes favour Williams.

I think Stroll is more bought in to the whole Mercedes 'B' team concept, Williams almost choked themselves buying the back end and gearbox in. It could be Russell at Williams if Mercedes can do a deal. A lot depends on what happens at Williams in the 2nd half of the year and into 2019 - could CW take a year or so out of the frontline and move into the boardroom? Will Paddy Lowe have to fall on his sword and move on. How they replace Stroll and Martini funding, it's believed that some other sponsors are linked to Lawrence Stroll too.

Clare is talking stable finances, but the next 6 months are still pretty crucial IMO and the knock on effect rolling into 2020 and the investment required for the new 2021 regs. This is why the timing of the poor car was so unfortunate for Williams.

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[BSchneiderFan]

Depends how badly Stroll and his consortium want/need Checo’s money, which if I recall is not insubstantial. Does anyone know what his and Ocon’s contractual situations are?

[E.B]

Originally Posted by BSchneiderFan

Depends how badly Stroll and his consortium want/need Checo’s money, which if I recall is not insubstantial. Does anyone know what his and Ocon’s contractual situations are?

Presumably Ocon's seat, given he is a Mercedes driver, comes with a discount on engines and ancillaries, so also comes with benefits. A Mercedes engine deal is probably a necessity to the new team, more so than Perez's Pesos.

[Tourer]

Originally Posted by BSchneiderFan

Depends how badly Stroll and his consortium want/need Checo’s money, which if I recall is not insubstantial. Does anyone know what his and Ocon’s contractual situations are?

It’s possible that their contractual situations with the previous ownership structure could be moot - depends on the terms of the sale. I would expect it all to be open to some negotiation.

[Moneyseeker]

Ocon had nowhere else to go and I can't see Mercedes wanting to stall his momentum and risk putting him in a Williams next year.

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[wnut]

The problem here is that Stroll only has Stroll junor's interests at heart, and could be stupid enough to install Jnr. and Kubica as drivers because of the threat that Ocon or Perez will make young Lance look pedestrian.
This will probably just kill of Force India.

Williams carries too much baggage and bloody mindedness to have much value as a Mercedes junior team, they will just take Merc's money and blow it elsewhere, ask BMW?

[BSchneiderFan]

Williams-BMW came close to winning the championship. Arguably the latter let the former down as much as vice-versa.

[S griffin]

BMW had a great team in BMW, it's just a shame things didn't quite work out for them

[BSchneiderFan]

The tie-up with Williams was Munich’s best shot at a title - Williams still remembered how to win races and championships in those days, and Schumacher/Montoya was a pretty decent line-up.

[Moneyseeker]

Williams must look in despair as whatever manufacturer interest there is in single seater racing is moving into FE, so they could remain 'geared up' for a works entry again that never materialises. Ironically Williams has a hand in FE as it was the battery supplier and runs the Jaguar FE team.



Williams -Jaguar has a nice ring to it, but Jaguar have never expressed an interest in returning to F1 as far as I know.

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Williams -Jaguar has a nice ring to it, but Jaguar have never expressed an interest in returning to F1 as far as I know.

Jaguar, per se, never even expressed an interest when they joined. The reality is that it was the close relationship between Sir Jackie and Ford that brought about the purchase of Stewart Grand Prix by Ford.



In turn, Ford named it Jaguar Racing purely as a marketing exercise, and Jaguar had no involvement in the team, with the engines coming from Cosworth and gearboxes, if I remember rightly, from Hewland.

[BSchneiderFan]

I don’t blame FMC for the “marketing exercise” of slapping the Jaguar moniker on the old Stewart GP team. I do blame them for clumsy corporate management and a lack of constancy. If Bobby Rahal had survived and tempted Adrian Newley away from Woking, the team might have flourished.

[S griffin]

Jaguar seem more up for it in FE

[BSchneiderFan]

The level of involvement required is rather lower in Formula E than running a factory F1 team in the early 2000s.